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Preparing hard drives

Hi all,

I'm new to this forum so I just wanted to introduce myself and ask a few questions. I've never used Linux before and I'd like to try it out. I bought myself a 80 GB HDD that would be Linux-only. The other HDD has Windows XP on it.

I've done some searching on the Internet and most web sites recommend Mandriva as a good Linux distribution for beginners, so I got it burned on a DVD. Now, I'm concerned about preparing my hard drives for Linux installation. The new HDD is brand new, I haven't partitioned it yet. Being on this forum longer than me, you guys probably know what problems beginners encounter the most - so, if you have any tips to share, I'd greatly appreciate it.

From what I've read, Linux requires several partitions. On the Linux HDD, I'd also like have one additional (FAT32?) partition for sharing files between Windows and Linux, and that's pretty much what I need. How should I make these partitions? Before installing or during the installation? (Note that I have absolutely no experience with the installer.) If before installing, with what tool? How many partitions do you recommend I should make?

You should have received a cd with your new hard drive, use that to partition the drive.
Make 2 partitions, one for Mandriva, one for Fat32.
The sizes are up to you.
If you want, make the partition for Mandriva 10-15 GB, and make the rest Fat32.
For Mandriva, don't format this partition, Mandriva will see it and install to it.
It will be hdb1, it will also create a swap and a / partition for you. That is all you really need.

What type of hard drive is it?
Most hard drive manufacturers supply tools that you can download for free ad put on cd/floppy.
Or you can use the tools in WinXP, Disk management.
Control Panel>Administrative Tools>Computer Management>Disk Management.
Here you might have to initialize the drive and then you can create the partitions.

mandriva has one of the nicest partitioning tools on any distro I've used. You should be fine to go ahead and create the scheme budman mentioned. It will also through the installer allow you to select Fat32 for your shared partition.